You shouldn’t be proud of your ‘work.’ Spreading intolerance, irrationality and anti-reason is nothing to be smug about. The whole point of this board is to discuss openly, objectively and apply reason. Being atheist and mystical is not a virtue I admire.

You shouldn’t be proud of your ‘work.’ Spreading intolerance, irrationality and anti-reason is nothing to be smug about. The whole point of this board is to discuss openly, objectively and apply reason. Being atheist and mystical is not a virtue I admire.

Such eruptions of emotion from an Objectivist yet.

I’ve only written one, highly subjective sentence about the great Ms. Rand. Does my rejection of Objectivism cause amazement? Am I the rare individual who reject’s Randian philosophy? (It is by all means not an “objectivist” philosophy, and that’s part of the problem.)

I’ve read just about everything she published plus various collections of letters, commentaries, biographies, etc. I’ve even read some of her serious philosophy. Although I don’t appreciate much within her philosophical material, I actually see her as an underrated fiction writer. She had plenty of value to say in her fiction.

Philosophy may in no way interfere with the actual use of language; it can in the end only describe it. For it cannot give it any foundations either. It leaves everything as it is.
Ludwig Wittgenstein

I’ve only written one, highly subjective sentence about the great Ms. Rand. Does my rejection of Objectivism cause amazement? Am I the rare individual who reject’s Randian philosophy? (It is by all means not an “objectivist” philosophy, and that’s part of the problem.)

You’re like one those university jocks who walks into your room while you’re having a serious conversation with your roommate, farts as load as possible, grins and walks out again. While the jock might say, “such eruptions of emotion, yet all I did was…”; and think ‘that to be an adequate contribution to the discussion and then saunter off while leaving his smell to linger. It is still worthwhile pondering his motives. Having said this, we know, that like the jock who got there by using every muscle in his body, but, the one between his ears and probably feels like contributing but doesn’t know how to, so it is that we can expect similar interlopers on such a forum dropping their guts and shuffling off, bewildered by why others’ faces are ever so slightly contorted.

You seem to like to attack defenseless straw-men wherever you go. So here it is again…at no point did I shy away from criticising Ayn Rand…I just want to emphasise that I cannot say that because she had crooked teeth, bad hair, poor dress sense, a russian accent, wasn’t particularly charismatic and lived a less than pious life; her philosophy is somehow irrelevant.

I will draw what I think might be a useful parallel for your consideration, then open a window and put a peg on my nose;

1. Just as creatards attack ‘Darwin’, the man; thinking that this will destroy his hypothesis, so do objectophobes attack ‘Rand’, the woman instead of her hypothesis.

2. Just as creatards attack ‘Darwinists’, as being believers in ‘Dawinian’ religion, without actually listening when we explain that terms like ‘Darwinism’ or ‘Darwinian’ are meaningless, so do objectophobes muddle-headedly ignore similar exhortations when using terms like ‘Randism’ and ‘Randian’ which are equally meaningless.

3. Just as creatards abuse the term ‘Selfish gene’, so do objectophobes abuse the term ‘Rational self-interest/selfishness’

4. Just as creatards are wishful thinkers when they tout ‘Intelligent design’ as a viable science, so do objectophobes enter wish county when espousing ‘Communism‘ or ‘Socialism’ as viable political system/s.

5. Just as ‘Evolution’ is the correct term to use, so is the term ‘Objectivism’, even if you wish to satyrise the philosophy, after all we would think it justly unfunny when in attacking evolution some creatard comedian goes after a ‘something from nothing by random chance’ line…

6. Just as ‘Natural selection’ is the undeniable vehicle of adaptation and survival in evolution so is ‘Capitalism’ the undeniable bearer or liberty and preserver of our species.

7. Just as creatards believe in a ‘Supernatural world’ and ‘Collectivism’, so do ojectivist evolutionists hold to a purely ‘Materialist’ and ‘Individualist’ paradigm…

It seems that on many levels creatards and objectophobes bear grudges against fictitious doctrine…wouldn’t you say?

I wonder if you’re still so pleased with yourself sitting in the back row peeling your banana while shouting ‘my grandpappy aint no monkey!!!’?

Nope, nonverbal - your avatar is apt, BTW - I’m not peeved at you at all, I’m just amused that you think your fart has made a contribution, I am however disappointed that all you can do is…fart, when I think that all I did was expect a bit more more from you as…

nonverbal - 13 May 2012 11:53 AM

I’ve read just about everything she published plus various collections of letters, commentaries, biographies, etc. I’ve even read some of her serious philosophy. Although I don’t appreciate much within her philosophical material, I actually see her as an underrated fiction writer. She had plenty of value to say in her fiction.

I had not idea you were on to my ways. This place is not exactly the RDF, though it is almost as dead.

PainfulButTrue - 13 May 2012 03:31 PM

...now I will open a window if you don’t mind…

You might want to ask your mother first.

If a friend of mine had done the kinds of things Ayn did to her already drunken husband and her boyfriend’s wife, I doubt if I’d be interested in continuing any but a very awkward personal friendship with her. I certainly wouldn’t elevate her to Brilliant Philosopher whose specialty is to preach morality to the world.

You make my point through your anger. If I’d actually said something that was mistaken, you’d have had something to correct. As it is, you ranted and raved as though I’d barged into your private club meeting. And by the way, this actually is an almost-dead forum in case you haven’t noticed, Wii-brain. It doesn’t surprise me to see you ranting and raving with bravado to an audience of a handful of wanderers at best. Those who are easily hypnotized tend not to be aware of their surroundings. Sorry to break the news to you, but fans and detractors of Sam Harris no longer hang out here.

Philosophy may in no way interfere with the actual use of language; it can in the end only describe it. For it cannot give it any foundations either. It leaves everything as it is.
Ludwig Wittgenstein

A few weeks ago, I found out about Sam Harris while watching youtube videos of Christopher Hitchens. Sam Harris’ arguments regarding scientific realism as applied to morality was extremely profound to me. It was also good to find out that Sam Harris is a proponent of meditation; I have been obsessed into transpersonal psychology and eastern philosophy recently. Anywho, it seems that I agree with Sam Harris on almost all fronts… except for one. Sam Harris said in one video that he would like to increase taxes on the rich. If I had watched the video a few months ago, I may have agreed with him. But I have been reading a lot about Ayn Rand, and I tend to agree that people need to pursue happiness based, preeminently, on self-interest. She Rand made sense to me when she claimed that the government’s function should simply be to protect individual rights. Maybe an extreme form of capitalism makes sense. I seem to be conflicted; on the one hand, I think we can be objective in determining what is moral and what isn’t. On the other hand, I feel a bit unnerved by forcing people to put money toward things that should be valued based on morals. Is it immoral to force people to put the money that they earn toward something that is moral? Is it moral to rob from the rich to give to the poor? I’m very open to people helping me work through this issue, so feel free to respond to this message. I also want to add that I am a poor grad student with many thousands of dollars of loans to pay back, so it’s not as though I’m some cantankerous rich guy.

Thanks,
Jon

You say you agree that people need to pursue happiness based, preeminently, on self-interest.
IMO the medical industry is doing just that. This is capitalism at it’s finest… http://kyrani99.wordpress.com/ it was not for capitalism that I have posted the blog but hey.. if you reckon.. enjoy!

You say you agree that people need to pursue happiness based, preeminently, on self-interest.
IMO the medical industry is doing just that. This is capitalism at it’s finest… http://kyrani99.wordpress.com/ it was not for capitalism that I have posted the blog but hey.. if you reckon.. enjoy!

Jesus, Mary and bloody Joseph…

kyrani99 if you are the author of the tripe posted at the link above, you have much more serious things to worry about than Ayn Rand. It seems you think that the entire universe is a big moo moo conspiracy and that everyone’s out to milk you. I suppose you buy into homeopathy as well, since you seem so chronically averse to allopathic treatment.

If I can find the time I might eviscerate this nonsense you’ve puked onto the internet. Poor unsuspecting dullards will buy into your crap and think that you actually have something worthwhile to say…oh what am I getting so bitter and twisted about, if they believe this nonsense they’re too far gone to save anyway. MInd you it’s probably best that I leave them to it, believing in this shinona might well dilute their numbers somewhat.

Anyway that was a good 5 minutes I’ll never get back, thank you very much…was that your way of repaying me for writing such a long post further up?...Well ‘Tou’ bloody ‘ché’.

Just out of pure interest, do you actually practice what you preach? Do you avoid allopathic treatments in favour of mumbojumbohoolala treatment? Or…do you slam these REAL treatments online and run back to your faithful medical practitioner when something serious comes knocking? Please don’t think I’m suggesting that you shouldn’t do this, I wouldn’t want you to suffer needlessly, but I would like you to bear this in mind when you next choose to embark on relieving yourself online…it’s really not pleasant and I fear it might linger.

PLEASE dear baby jesus promise me you won’t have any children, and in the name of allah-lalah please tell me you don’t have any…you are a walking example of why it is high time to introduce parent licenses.

You say you agree that people need to pursue happiness based, preeminently, on self-interest.
IMO the medical industry is doing just that. This is capitalism at it’s finest… http://kyrani99.wordpress.com/ it was not for capitalism that I have posted the blog but hey.. if you reckon.. enjoy!

Jesus, Mary and bloody Joseph…

kyrani99 if you are the author of the tripe posted at the link above, you have much more serious things to worry about than Ayn Rand. It seems you think that the entire universe is a big moo moo conspiracy and that everyone’s out to milk you. I suppose you buy into homeopathy as well, since you seem so chronically averse to allopathic treatment.

If I can find the time I might eviscerate this nonsense you’ve puked onto the internet. Poor unsuspecting dullards will buy into your crap and think that you actually have something worthwhile to say…oh what am I getting so bitter and twisted about, if they believe this nonsense they’re too far gone to save anyway. MInd you it’s probably best that I leave them to it, believing in this shinona might well dilute their numbers somewhat.

Anyway that was a good 5 minutes I’ll never get back, thank you very much…was that your way of repaying me for writing such a long post further up?...Well ‘Tou’ bloody ‘ché’.

Just out of pure interest, do you actually practice what you preach? Do you avoid allopathic treatments in favour of mumbojumbohoolala treatment? Or…do you slam these REAL treatments online and run back to your faithful medical practitioner when something serious comes knocking? Please don’t think I’m suggesting that you shouldn’t do this, I wouldn’t want you to suffer needlessly, but I would like you to bear this in mind when you next choose to embark on relieving yourself online…it’s really not pleasant and I fear it might linger.

PLEASE dear baby jesus promise me you won’t have any children, and in the name of allah-lalah please tell me you don’t have any…you are a walking example of why it is high time to introduce parent licenses.

STOP believing in bull-twang please! READ A REAL BOOK!!!!!!

I haven’t seen a doctor for anything for 20 years! I bet that is better than you or anyone else can say. You don’t need others to get well and stay well, you just get your body to do the work. Those that go to doctors and any other healers are fools.

As for my work, it can and will be verified SCIENTIFICALLY by lay, humane people who will do the experiments. It is in their interests anyway. As for those that support the toxic under-culture and who bow down to Big Pharma, they are the losers in the end so who cares about them. Smoke your pipe and dream away and sail into oblivion.